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COMMENTARY / World
Apr 7, 2014

Can a nuclear-weapons state champion disarmament?

India should be the one to step forward to champion a phased, regulated and verifiable global nuclear disarmament governed by a universal, nondiscriminatory nuclear weapons convention.
EDITORIALS
Apr 7, 2014

Taiwan's 'sunflowers' bloom

A student-led occupation of the Taiwanese government's legislature to protest a cross-strait trade agreement — which is the centerpiece of President Ma Ying-jeou's political and economic agenda — enters its third week.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Apr 5, 2014

Lessons of Fukushima: Reactor restarts are unwise

Kyle Cleveland, my colleague at Temple University Japan, recently published a report in the online Asia-Pacific Journal, "Mobilizing Nuclear Bias: The Fukushima Nuclear Crisis and the Politics of Uncertainty" that has drawn widespread media attention. Based on numerous interviews with government officials,...
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 1, 2014

The cost of corporate kowtowing to Beijing

American general interest family magazine, Reader's Digest, is alleged to have censored stories for its worldwide English edition to maintain a cheap printing deal in China.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 1, 2014

The Affordable Care Act isn't Obama's 'Iraq'

The new signup numbers — 6 million and counting — on the U.S. Affordable Care Act exchanges make it clear that the roll-out of the bungled federal website didn't destroy the law and probably didn't cost President Barack Obama much in lasting public opinion.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Mar 30, 2014

City on East-West divide shapes Ukraine's fate

Lenin looks out on Donetsk, unmoved, anthracite gray and steely eyed. But a century after his revolution, this Ukrainian industrial city of Porsches and poverty seethes around him.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Mar 22, 2014

Okinawa redux: Democracy and an alliance at risk

U.S. Ambassador Caroline Kennedy made a meet-and-greet trip to Okinawa last month, an opportunity to gauge the lay of the land and listen to some of the stakeholders in the longstanding controversies over plans to reduce America's military footprint in the prefecture.
WORLD
Mar 6, 2014

Ukraine may lead to entente between Russia, China

China's reaction to events in Ukraine will probably prove more important in the long run than the responses of the United States and the EU.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 24, 2014

Future looks dull from Washington

Absent an event that upends the country, Washington seems likely to be a lot less important over the next few years than it was over the past few years.
JAPAN / Politics / KANSAI PERSPECTIVE
Feb 23, 2014

'Warring States' turmoil alive and well

Japanese historians date the Warring States Period roughly from the middle of the 15th century to the beginning of the 17th century. But when it comes to Kansai politics, modern observers could be forgiven for thinking the ancient feuds and jealous rivalries of the regional lords are not yet over.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / JAPAN WEB WATCH
Feb 20, 2014

'Kantai Collection': Social game of warships sets course for big money

Casual online games based on military themes and with a kawaii (cute) twist are currently a surprise hit in Japan. Is this related to the recent rightward tilt in national politics, or just part of Japan's creative desire to "cutify" everything.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 19, 2014

'The refusal of time' is worth every minute

The former Rissei Elementary School site, nowadays an occasional cultural events center, was earlier home to the Kyoto Dento, the electric company whose technology helped industrialist Katsutaro Inabata to demonstrate the Lumière Brothers' cinématographe camera in 1897 — Japan's first experience...
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 17, 2014

The last of the Sudeiri Seven

Never before have the intrigues and intricacies of royal politics in Saudi Arabia had such far-reaching ramifications for the region and beyond as they do now.
LIFE / Language / WELL SAID
Feb 16, 2014

Nante kanshin-na ojōsan-nano!

Today we will introduce the usage of the two nouns that are homonyms but are written with different kanji, u304bu3093u3057u3093uff08u611fu5fc3uff09and u304bu3093u3057u3093uff08u95a2u5fc3uff09, and their related expressions.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Feb 10, 2014

Mutual fears of China, Japan

China and Japan are perceiving more and more threats from each other, and their overactive responses are causing strong sense of insecurity for the region. The vicious circle is driving an escalating arms race.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Feb 8, 2014

Yuichiro Miura: on top of the world

Ever wondered what it feels like to stand on top of the world? Eighty-one-year-old alpinist Yuichiro Miura should know: He's done it three times since turning 70. He became the oldest person to scale the world's tallest peak, Mount Everest, in May last year, a remarkable feat that spurred the government...
COMMENTARY / Japan
Feb 7, 2014

Lessons for fixing Fukushima

In March 2011 all of Japan was united by the terrible experience of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident. Three years later this unity is increasingly fracturing as a more uneven reality emerges.
JAPAN / ANALYSIS
Feb 7, 2014

NHK governors' impartiality doubted

Shocking remarks like "there was no Nanjing Massacre" and "the gender equality law triggered Japan's low birthrate" by NHK governors appointed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe have called into question the qualifications and neutrality of the public broadcaster's board and the biased way its members are...
Japan Times
WORLD
Jan 26, 2014

Religious differences to fuel this century's bloody wars

The last weeks have seen a ghastly roll call of terrorist attacks in the obvious places: Syria, Libya, Iraq and Lebanon, as well as Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia and Pakistan. Also suffering are places where we have only in recent years seen such violence: Nigeria, and in many parts of central Africa, in Russia...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 25, 2014

Spinmeister Abe: crisis-mongering and distractions

The news media tends to hyperventilate because this generates a buzz that attracts attention.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 23, 2014

16 kick off Tokyo gubernatorial race

Campaigning for the Tokyo gubernatorial election officially kicked off Thursday with 16 candidates set to battle over national-level issues ranging from energy policy to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 23, 2014

Tokyo voters unhappy with nuclear focus

Campaigning for the Tokyo gubernatorial race starts and voters express bewilderment over how fast the focus seems to have turned to nuclear energy.
Reader Mail
Jan 22, 2014

Avoiding the nuclear debate

Regarding the Jan. 17 Kyodo article "Fukushima No. 1 engineer's warning to Taiwan: Nuclear power unstable": So now we know that the government — the Liberal Democratic Party, that is — was not only clearly informed of the likelihood of a nuclear disaster but has been deliberately covering up this...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 20, 2014

The failed Turkish coup by 'Gulen' bureaucrats

Recent developments in Turkey reflect the widening rift between the Erdogan government and the so-called Gulen movement. Judicial reform must eliminate the possibility of organized cliques manipulating constitutional powers to advance their own narrow goals.
JAPAN / View from Osaka
Jan 18, 2014

Ishin's Osaka wing hopes Tamogami loses in Tokyo

To the frustration — and rising panic — of nuclear village chieftain and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Tokyo's gubernatorial election next month is shaping up to be a contest not about "local" issues like the 2020 Tokyo Olympics or even perennial complaints such as the lack of economic reform. Barring...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 17, 2014

'Allah,' the word that's pulling Malaysia apart

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak's silence in the police investigtion of a Catholic priest for using the word 'Allah' when referring to God highlights misplaced priorities that are holding Malaysia back even as Indonesia and other neighbors zoom forward.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 13, 2014

Why Pope Francis is right to call inequality unjust

To say that Pope Francis' preoccupation with inequality promotes the sin of envy and that inequality in itself is of no great account doesn't make much sense to Harvard lecturer on ethics and public policy.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Jan 12, 2014

Sharon's life shaped Israel, mirrored its turbulent times

The death of former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who had been in a deep coma since suffering a stroke in January 2006, represents an extraordinary moment of rupture in his country's history. Of the generation of Israeli soldiers and politicians who fought in Israel's founding conflicts, only...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 8, 2014

New York's Apples make a big impression

In the last three months since I arrived in New York to study American drama with a grant from the Asian Cultural Council, a U.S. nonprofit dedicated to international cultural exchange, I have been to the theater more than 70 times — including at least a dozen visits to somewhere that's been a truly...

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years